Public Transportation in the USSR. Riding a Soviet City Bus

[@UshankaShow]

Hello, comrades! My name is Sergei. I was born in the USSR in 1971. Since 1999 I have lived in the USA. Ushanka Show channel was created to share stories as well as my own memories of everyday life in the USSR. My book about arriving to America in 1995 is available on Amazon: www.amazon.com/s?i=stripbooks&rh=p_27%3ASergei+Sputnikoff&s=relevancerank&text=Sergei+Sputnikoff&ref=dp_byline_sr_book_1 You can support this project here: www.patreon.com/sputnikoff with monthly donations Support for this channel via PAYPAL: paypal.me/ushankashow Ushanka Show merchandise: teespring.com/stores/ushanka-show-shop If you are curious to try some of the Soviet-era candy and other foodstuffs, please use the link below. www.russiantable.com/imported-russian-chocolate-mishka-kosolapy__146-14.html?tracking=5a6933a9095f9 My FB: facebook.com/sergey.sputnikoff Twitter: twitter.com/ushankashow Instagram: instagram.com/ushanka_show/ Reddit: www.reddit.com/r/The_Ushanka_Show/

[@doncarlin9081]

I've traveled around the world, and I can assure you, many, many buses are not air conditioned, even in very hot tropical countries. And they can get crowded. I was on one bus that not only packed in the aisle, near by mothers were fighting over who could put one of their kids in my lap lol.

[@valerija.legasov548]

Ikarus bus was also in the Czechoslovakia. Our industry produced legendary Karosa buses, Liaz trucks, Tatra produced also trucks and lots of variants, CKD Praha produced metro trains, trams, Skoda Plzen produced trams, train engines, Vagonka produced wide train vagons etc.

[@ErdenizS]

Ikarus buses were used for municipal transportation in many cities here in Turkey too. I think some of them lasted even into early 2000s

[@adaspaker8404]

stop islam

[@archlich4489]

Hello to Turkey from North Carolina

[@laurens.712]

I rode one in Abkhazia in 2013!

[@kalantor100]

True! I remember them and they were very reliable.

[@Horvi83]

IKARUS forever - cheers from Hungary! :) Congratulations for editing these videos! :)

[@RogerThat787]

Another Ushanka Show Banger of a video.

[@PanGrono]

We had Ikarus also in Poland even after socialism. Best municipal transport busses ever:)

[@badblondie01]

Beautiful video! Very interesting :) I love it.

[@bernardebisonchibhamu222]

Great staff thank u Ushanka Show. here in Zimbabwe bus transport system was somehow similar to Russia's during my childhood days the 1970s

[@deanromania6748]

13:58 In Romania we had a similar situation with one of the locally produced models of buses. I am of course talking about the Roman 111 RD bus, also known as "RATA". Aparently, the engine bay was not isolated well enough from the cabin and smoke would get inside. However, this was worse since the engine was a diesel one, the same one on the Ikarus but naturally aspirated instead of turbocharged (although some of them had turbo's). Some people claim that if you would sneak your hand underneath some cushions in the back, you would be able to accelerate the bus and the driver would be confused on why the bus is accelerating by itself but I don't know whether these stories are true or not. Nowadays, only the army still uses these buses. I don't think there are private companies still operating them.

[@sarjim4381]

I was about to ask why you didn't take a train. I visited Russia in 2006 and took trains and busses, I much prefered the trains. Faster, more comfortable, and I got to see a lot of the "backyards" of Russia. I will look forward to your train programs. One of my goals is still to ride the Trans Siberian Ralway.

[@sarjim4381]

Thanks, I thought that was the case. I think most Russians would prefer to take a train instead of the rattletrap local busses.

[@kakumee]

I had one of your books in English i believe!! I don't know if i still have it(a few moves, clean out,and a few floods) I actually enjoyed it!

[@opl500]

It's costs you either money or time, in a linear combination.

[@harishankarpandey455]

Very nice 👌

[@Merle1987]

Can you make one about city buses in the Soviet Union? I've heard they had good bus service within the cities.

[@ryancrawford5029]

Turns out the soviet dream was the same as the American dream! Comfortable stylish pants, a tolerable job with vacation time, a date and booze on a Fri night, and a quiet clean place where you and your family could lay your head at night. I feel ya comrade Sergei!

[@ashimovroman]

Сергей, это просто классный канал для восприятия английского языка на слух! Вы здесь говорите естественной интонацией, но со славянским акцентом:), и все слова хорошо различимы (для меня). Понимаю я, по разговору, процентов 30, но по содержанию процентов 90. Буду по этому каналу учить английский на слух! Успехов Вам! Have a good one! :) Тем более Украина моя вторя родина!

[@Jan.99]

Very nice.! What're the driving safety standards in USSR? Did the drivers follow traffic rules properly?

[@ivarkich1543]

In Soviet times, they never stopped the car before a crosswalk. Where a crosswalk was marked on a wider street (4 lanes or more), people had to have extremely sophisticated skills of crossing a street because the drivers never slowed down as if there were no pedestrians.

[@intel386DX]

Icarus buses and trolleys were popular in Bulgaria as well

[@manichamartia8775]

I don't know why I enjoy you explaining what your life was like and the USSR when you were young?. From transportation, cars, housing, even bread and collectibles. Soda fountains were disturbing though.

[@mapgar1479]

In the United States we have a federal and interstate highway system with state and county highways to supplement the federal routes. Did the USSR have a superhighways system consisting of international motorways connecting the nations of the U.S.S.R. in addition to domestic highway systems in each nation? Also: What did the logos of these highways look like and what were the rules of the road when driving in the U.S.S.R.?

[@paulblichmann2791]

Yeah well have you ever used American Grayhound? They would also take 12 hours to go 190 miles. Back then they were probably hit and miss re AC as well. You weren't missing anything!

[@giorgarospanagakis9573]

In Athens during the 80s we had Icarus Bus for public transport

[@Krzemieniewski1]

Ikaruses were made in Budapest, Hungary.

[@FilK79]

There were two Ikarus bus factories, one in Hungary and the other in Yugoslavia. Later in 1990s the Hungarian won the right to use the name, so the Yugoslav one changed to Ikarbus.

[@eatonjask]

Ikarus also had a factory in the US for a while in the 1980s

[@manolokonosko2868]

You can judge a country by the way it treats its old citizens and by the toilets. BOTH must be of excellent quality, not either/or.

[@iverar]

This is great, Sergey! Those bathrooms sound horrible. I think I just would not eat for a few days and drink very little so I would not have to use those bathrooms. Or maybe you could walk into the forest by the bus stop and go! Were the roads in Ukraine during the USSR good or not so great? Did the state do a good job plowing snow off these roads in winter - especially the rural roads between villages?

[@simonrichard9873]

LAZ-695 had the exact same engine as in the ZiL-130 truck.

[@downychick]

Oh Sergei, what a horrible bathroom experience. I thought US rest areas has nasty bathrooms when I was a kid. Turns out we had it easy!

[@juliek2934]

My family and I lived in Kiev as well. I still have step brothers that live in our communist era apartment. I am just now, at 29, thinking to ask my mom about life in communism when she was young (she is 64, we have here around 1993)... the things she has told me from her life and our family's life in Kiev sound terrifying to me. I have never appreciated the freedoms we have in America as much as I do today. She told me the first people to leave after the USSR fell faced lines of people yelling 'traitor' and other obscenities... and many other crazy things. Obviously people survived in the USSR and some thrived, but now I am beginning to understand why my dad drank so much when we lived in Kiev and stopped drinking for the most part when we moved to the US.

[@jacobschneider1455]

That's pretty interesting. This makes me wonder. What was the train system like.

[@jurisprudens]

It has not change much in today's Russia. Three types of sleeping carts for long distance travel + seated commuter carts.

[@Gopferteckel]

Those Volga 24’s Strongly resemble our locally built HR Holdens.

[@иосифгерман-п8о]

I took the Bus from Kyiv to Krakow Poland These are great cheap buss only 500 Grivna Ukraine transportation today is great quality

[@иосифгерман-п8о]

united kingdom polski bus are very cheap undeed from Modlin airport to Warszawa is 45minit Busride only about €2 Euroline Krakau (Pl) - Breda (NL) €28 So depending from where you leave in Ukrain to where you go could actually go from Ukraine to Netherlands, Belgium or Germany for less than €60 depending where you get your ticket I think the return ticket policy only applies for Ukrainian Citizens so that they do not defect to other countries now that they have freedom of movement with in the EU

[@penskepc2374]

The Soviets had those awesome Trolleybuses.

[@IrishPartizan]

In the USSR you had the Vent and Bitch Wars. LOL!

[@parasatc8183]

USHANKA SHOW Either. It sounds like anyone participating in a vent war is being petty, but the atmosphere might be very tense. I don't know if I should either laugh, be scared, or just try to shut my ears in annoyance in such a situation.

[@seangurevich5077]

Hi sergey. I would like to hear more about elections in the Soviet Union. Of course there was only one party but my grandmoher (born and raised in Zaporizhye Ukraine) told me that there were still elections. So can you please explain more about them?

[@seangurevich5077]

Thanks. Спасибо Болшоя!

[@ladycrystalr-u.s.a]

I am #1000 to like the video.

[@UshankaShow]

Awesome!

[@josh656]

I learned you can't politely file into a busy Moscow Metro station like in the U.S. Instead it's no-holds-barred shoving and squeezing...I even had an old babushka elbow me to squeeze past through the turn style.

[@josh656]

@thetimekillerx I came back to the states ready to take on any commuters!

[@josh656]

@thetimekillerx Good point and if your commute was stressful there is always a beer kiosk at the market outside the Metro.

[@floatpvnk]

The toilet story somewhat reminds me of the one and only experience I had using a NYC subway toilet at the platform. It was almost as ghastly as the village bus stop toilet you went into, excrement everywhere. I hope for the safety of the public the mta closed down those toilets, total health risk. 🤮

[@dr.valbell6427]

I mean no offense (I grew up in the 70s & early 80s) but if your average American knew how broke, poor & pathetic the Soviet people & their lives were, the Cold War would’ve been over by 1960. Wow. Many aspects of Soviet life were actually worse than many so-called ‘Third World Hell-holes.’

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

The advantage of a car is that you don't have to stop in a small town like the radiator spring in film cars. so don't waste time. where you just need to fill up gas. goodbye small town hello big city. hello sub urban

[@kalantor100]

Hi Sergei, thanks for your great videos. I enjoy every one of them. I have a question, I grew up in western Germany during the 70ies and 80ies. When I was in 9th grade, it must have been around 1987, in geography class we were taught about the Soviet Union. Our teacher told us that in Soviet Union every kind of public transportation was heavily subsidized by the state. He said, sometimes you would see a babushka from a small town with a basket full of eggs from her farm take a plane to Moscow, sell her eggs at the market, fly back and still make a profit. Of course it was western propaganda to make the Soviet system look ridiculous and inefficient but I was so fascinated about that story because I always loved flying and I thought, wow in Soviet Union everyone can afford it. So, could anything about that have been true or is it all made up? Thanks for your answer!

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

in the United States on the other hand as in LA one way to move between cities is not by train or bus but by car. Good thing everyone has a yes. even the homeless have cars

[@Mr71paul71]

Yes i remember getting the shock of my life the first time i used a road side toilet in Ukraine !!!!! Not for the faint hearted

[@thehillbillygamer2183]

What was the name of the village what was the village called

[@1joshjosh1]

You just got to wake up earlier man. 😆

[@becconvideo]

Did they have bus and train services parallel or was there no train service between Kiev and the north of Ukrain?

[@UshankaShow]

No direct train line that way

[@simarsingh7993]

11:16 The public bathroom in India is 10X worse

[@anahuerta6391]

I want to buy the book. I am not good with computer stuff

[@иосифгерман-п8о]

Going Kyiv-Kharkiv by buss not a pleasant trip the road stops are terrible and you have to switch Bus at 3Am

[@zecarlosaquino2767]

legenda espanish

[@user-bw3fl7fj9w]

You use koff instead of kov...in ending of your last name, so is your family originally from Germany?

[@yurekyurek1367]

Hello! Is it possible to use the ukrainian driver's license in the USA?

[@LordOrio]

well, you can use any car license, as long as both countries excange information (have diplopmatic releations), of corse much more precise information will be aviable at enbasies or yur contries license overseerer(the place where they keep al the info abbout everibody who has license).

[@donalgeaney626]

How do I find your patreon !

[@ascendedfashy9632]

Would you say the people were happy in the ussr?

[@mj3299]

@@UshankaShow Sergey! I love these videos. I guess that they were happy because they didn't know any better . I am fascinated by the history of Russia and the USSR. If you have time check out the videos of Prof Milton Friedman kzbin.info/www/bejne/eorIioOZpNqao6M . The most fundamental of his teachings is the freedom to choose. kzbin.info/www/bejne/emSxY6aEo6yql5Y. The way it is now, the young generations are not aware of the Stalin era and what misery it brought to the people of the USSR, maybe you can speak about these topics in the future. Much respect for the Russian people but they suffered needlessly at the hand of their own leaders.

[@dcan911]

@@mj3299 Friedman had no interest whatsoever in the happiness or wellbeing of the working person.

[@paulblichmann2791]

If everyone had a car it would take 1 hour to drive 10 miles just like in US.

[@UshankaShow]

If you live in the city, of course. I love having a car after 20 years of public transportation drama. But I live in rural Michigan

[@alfonsoflorio]

i prefer... hardbass lol

[@anahuerta6391]

What's the average temperature in Ukraine during the summer.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Same with Canada

[@mathewvanostin7118]

The south is high heat like in spain or italy But north and west ukraine summer are very similar to summer in germany or moscow

[@Lexus3377]

you could take a goat on a metro,haha

[@plumbherhub1664]

No way those are horses with the shell of a car.

[@Urtello]

на патрон ссылки нет

[@MrJm323]

Geez, those "toilets"! ....And this was the late '70s, early '80s in the USSR?!? Yeah, it's rural Russia (or Ukraine), I know; but, a PUBLIC restroom on an established bus route or a highway rest stop in the U.S.A. ...ALWAYS... had sit-down (pedestal) toilets. You had a serious ground for complaint in the U.S. if the gas station attendants or restroom managers simply forgot to stock it with toilet paper! Obviously, outhouses and the like still exist in America where there is no plumbing (running water); but, if there is plumbing, certainly for the last one hundred years, a toilet for "doing number two" was a pedestal water closet! ...In my fifty-two years of existence in America, I've never seen a PUBLIC toilet just have a hole offered up for defecation. ....Nevermind that Russia never made a manned landing on the Moon; to have THAT as an acceptable public place for relieving oneself - ANYWHERE in the U.S.S.R. - would be ALONE proof of the failure of Communism to supply the material needs of the people! The idea that a bus company would PLAN to stop there so that its paying passengers could "do their business" (in addition to stretching their legs, buy snacks, etc.) tells the viewer of the material conditions in the Soviet Union ...in the LATE SEVENTIES...!!!!

[@омега337омега33]

Дырка в полу не проблема - можно приспособится.Главное туда попасть!

[@JohnnyAmerique]

MrJm323 What would become the USSR was a third-world country in 1917. It went through a civil war, and then a foreign invasion to prop up the failing White Army. In 1941, it was invaded again, this time by the Nazis, losing 27 million citizens and ~70% of its agro-industrial capacity. Yet, just 12 years after the end of what we call WWII, the USSR was the first country to launch satellites into space. By this time, it was also the second largest economy in the entire world, and the world leader in many departments of industry. In contrast, the USA was already the world’s largest economy in 1917, and suffered exactly zero damage to its agro-industrial potential in WWII. The main problem in the USSR wasn’t socialism per se - when the Soviet Union was under the leadership of Marxist-Leninists, it was the most rapidly advancing economy in the world by far - but rather the ideological revisionism introduced by the traitor Khrushchev and various other opportunists after the death of comrade Stalin. In any case, the USA today is collapsing for precisely the same reasons the USSR was failing in the 1980’s: Lack of investment in basic infrastructure, too much spending on the military, cuts to R&D, over-reliance on raw materials exports, a decadent and self-serving ruling class, and so on.

[@JohnnyAmerique]

There were famines throughout Eastern Europe for centuries prior to the revolution. The Soviet policy of mechanization and collectivization, whatever its faults, ensured that the 1932-33 Soviet famine (BTW - there was also a famine on at the exact same time in the US and other advanced capitalist countries, also claiming millions of lives, yet we curiously never hear a damn thing about that) was the last one. You are brainwashed and manipulated by the western capitalist ruling class, who are still scared shitless about the revolutionary science of Marxism-Leninism, and the historically unprecedented accomplishments of the USSR, especially under Stalin. BTW - the USSR was the world's fastest growing and most technologically innovative economy for decades because the NKVD took grain from kulak hoarders in the 1930's? Really? That's obvious bullshit and an blatant non-sequitur which you clearly don't even believe yourself.

[@DipakBose-bq1vv]

I have seen people defecating by the side of the express way between San Francisco and Santa Barbara.

[@Deerock_FL]

Ive heard them called "French Toilets"

[@vukstefanovic5348]

Ikarbus was made in Yugoslavia

[@FilK79]

There were 2 Ikarus, one in Hungary and other in Yugoslavia. Yugoslav changed name to Ikarbus during 1990s because Hungarian factory won the rght over the name.

[@vukstefanovic5348]

@@FilK79 didn't know that, thank you

[@Jeffcrocodile]

vent wars lol

[@hugochavez5862]

USHANKA MAN ONLY REPLIES IF YOU GIVE HIM 1 DOLLAR

[@genakozyr9027]

why you say come back to поrussia, soviete but you come back to Ukraine, Ukraineor not soviete and поrussia.wow, chokolovka? i am now levean in chokolovka, volynska street.

[@UshankaShow]

Ул. Молодогвардейская 16 мой старый дом где я жил в начале 80-х.

[@paulblichmann2791]

Month of paid vacation vs having no car? Easy decision. 🌴⛱️⛷️🎿🛋️

[@UshankaShow]

With the Soviet salary, you wouldn't be able to afford palm tree vacation